Owls

It was a beautiful day for painting. I wanted to add a dash of fall in preparation for back to school night. That Artisit Woman's oil pastel and water color owl project was just the ticket. (Especially since many of the kids are excited about the new Legends of the Guardians movie that opens this weekend.)

I got the idea to make these work boards from her too. They have made painting with thirty kids so much easier. The boards keep the desks clean, they hold the paper flat, they keep it from blowing away....

and they make for quite a nice hallway gallery too.

Hope you have a sunny weekend!

Craft Club -Owls

Love these. They are loosely based on a paper machae birds tutorial from Art for Little Hands.
Craft Club was a huge success. Sometimes I had 15 students and other times I had about 5. Either way it always just worked out. I really enjoyed the laid back discussions we could have. I really believe more than anything else children want to have time to talk with the adults in their lives. When the craft project had a "just right" level of difficulty the children were engaged and also could make conversation. Those were the best days. I learned so much about their lives and minds.

While I relish having the summer off, I really do look forward to going back -refreshed- and ready for another year of fourth grade. Fourth graders are the best.

Craft Club- Texture Street Scene

Inspired by our Lost and Found box.

The art club made their own texture studies.










This was a last minute idea of mine. I cut the flaps off of boxes from the recycling pile.

I  gave the kids some stuff to work with. It was mostly junk. I showed them how to peel back the layers on cardboard to reveal the texture. I also showed them how to make tabs so things would stick out. They came up with their own ideas and at times I helped by hot gluing things down.

Then I took everything home and gave it a coat of white primer spray paint.

I think this might have been their favorite project yet.

Craft Club- Steampunk Softies

The steampunk robots are done!
They are joined by a skeleton lady...

a pair of steampunk Sponge Bob Square Pants...


and a steampunk fairy.


The Crayons were *amazed* by the Citra-Solv transfer. I was amazed by how well they did with sewing. We might have to try more sewing projects.

“If you can't feed a hundred people, then just feed one.”

Mother Teresa Or if send a pair of socks! You can send your socks directly to Comfort Socks:

 Comfort Socks
  PO Box 477
  Supply, NC 28462

Thanks to everyone who has already sent socks! 

My First Quilling Students

My dear friend Alli has started her own quilling blog! She has several adorable quilling projects for Easter posted. Be sure you check it out and give her some comment love too!

Anyway, kind heart that she is, she donated a whole box of quilling paper and curling tools to my craft club!!

So last Friday, when no parents showed up for parent conferences (funny how that happened she says with a knowing smile) I was alone in my room. Three girls came wandering in looking for something to do. Lucky timing! I put them to work trying out my quilling lesson.  They were the perfect guinea pigs because they represented grades 3, 4, and 5 and none of the girls had ever even heard of quilling.

In no time at all they were quilling with success. They each made a flower and we glued them to some old business cards. Two business cards glued together makes a pretty nice gift tag.

Now, the true quilling test would be at craft club...with the boys.

No worries. All the boys happily made quilled flowers. The project was to make flowers and leaves for a spring branch. I gave everyone red paper to start and then the girls asked for other colors. Soon the boys wanted other colors too.

A few years ago I took my third graders to the Ghetty Villa in Malibu. As they roamed the halls of antiqueties they called out, "Hey look it's Poseidon!" and "There are the sirens!" We got many stares from the "upper crust" folks. Several people stopped me and asked me how these kids knew so much about Greek Mythology. To which I replied, "They learned it at school." I felt so happy for them making it in another world, really.

That's how I felt when we were all sitting around quilling.

Five Dollar Challenge- Kids Craft! Easy Mini Easter Baskets

It's two for one today! While in the 99 Cents Only store, I happened upon these cute little peat pots.

Since I am not a gardener, I was not familiar with these babies. So much goodness for so little money! I have 30 students this year, so this was a jackpot! We could make an entire class craft for just about $4! Makes my heart sing!

Supplies: Peat pots, each basket uses 1 1/2 peat pots, hole puncher, brads, craft paint, Easter grass, any other embellishments you like. I used some curling ribbon. I also used a hot glue gun on one of the baskets.

Step one: The Handle
I think pipe cleaners would also make great handles, but I didn't have any. So, I improvised and cut an inch rim off a peat pot and used it as a handle. Then I used the hole puncher to make holes for the handle and on each side of the basket. Just for fun, I used scallop craft scissors for one of the handles.


Step two: Paint your pot and handle. I used regular acrylic craft paint. At school I will use regular tempera school paint. Allow it to dry for a while. These pots are really absorbent and they take a while to dry. It would be fun to embellish these with stickers, tissue paper flowers, quilled flowers-anything really.


Step three: Attach the handle. My students will be using paper brads to attach their handles. I decided I liked the skinny little rim that I had cut off one pot and hot glued that as a handle.

Step four: Fill with grass and candy!

Since these are so easy and so economical it would be fun for kids to make one for each place setting. I remember once I made school ice cream stick Pilgrims for our Thanksgiving place markers. I felt so important contributing to the holiday table.


Cost break down:
16 peat pots - 0.9999 (Yes, that is how 99 Cents Only prices things!)
curling ribbon- Stash-I had it at home, but I got it at the 99 Cents Only a while back
Easter Grass- ditto
paint- stash
brads and hot glue- stash

When I make these with my class on Friday I will buy two more packs of peat pots, grass and jelly beans for a grand total of $4! Whoo Hoo!


Now the real question is: How much will I spend at the dollar store after visiting all of the other challenge participants???

Craft Club Project 2- Steampunk Robot Softies

I am a big fan of Steampunk art. It really captures my imagination and I admire the vast creativity. I knew my Craft Club Crayons would think it was neat too.Their steampunk images are coming along nicely. So far they have several robots and a steampunk Sponge Bob.  I can hardly wait to share the finished results. In the meantime, here is a tutorial.

I collected a variety of steampunk images to view. I found these all on Google images.

Here are our inspirational images:
Steampunk Robots
Steampunk Charlie Brown
Steampunk Willy
Steampunk Crow
Steampunk Dog
Robots
Cup of Robots
Pair of Robots

From there, we discussed some of the common ideas in Steampunk like stitching, rivets, metal, gears, pins etc. Because I want craft club to be free of anxiety and drawing gears would make me anxious, I googled "gears", "clockworks" and other steampunk stuff. I cut in pasted those images into a word document and made a page of all sorts of images that the kids could cut out and use in their drawings.

I modeld drawing a robot and added some gears and steampunky stuff to my image. Then when I was done I traced over some of the lighter parts with a black felt tip marker.

The red arrows point to all the images I pasted on to my robot.
Next step, photo copy.


Then Citra-Solve transfer on to muslin. (You can read my post on that process here.) I was thrilled that the lighter details came out so clear! As always, you can click on any of these pictures to get a better view over at Flickr.

To make our robots into little softies, I simply laid another piece of muslin over the top of the image and sewed around the image. The fabric was thin enough that I could see through easily.

Next, I cut 'er out and stuffed her up. Simple stitches finished her off.



I think the Crayons will be able to do every step except for photocopy (not allowed in the teachers room) and the sewing machine part. They will be able to do the transfer and the hand sewing.

Craft Club: Project One - Stained Glass Paper Name Collages

Craft Club is awesome! Just reviewing these photos fills me with good feelings!

On Wednesday I had about ten kids show up. They finished their stained glass effect name collages. We listened to classic Jackson 5 and talked about our favorite movies. 

One of the kids in Craft Club has severe behavioral problems at school. Most of my Crayons are afraid of this belligerent child and I was a little concerned about having him stay after too. I think we were all plesantly surprised to learn that he really can be a nice kid. Craft club was pure harmony.  I feel both encouraged and angered by this. How many jails will be built before the educational pendulum swings back and true arts education is available for everyone?

We can do no great things, only small things with great love.  ~Mother Teresa

To help keep things in perspective this should be tattooed on every inner city teacher's hand.

Would you like to to make one? Here's what we did:

First we taped our paper to an art board. The blue painters tape came from the dollar store and the hardboard art boards came from home depot. I think they are about 14" X 20". Then we wrote our names with bubble letters. An easy trick for bubble letters is to first write the letter in very light pencil. Then trace around the letter and finally, erase the inside letter.

Next we traced all sorts of stencils around our names. I should do a whole post about my stencils. They are over ten years old and still going strong. I made them from laminated tag board and cut them using the Ellison presses at this wonderful Learning Resource Center in East Orange, NJ.

 
Next, we mixed Elmers glue with black acrylic craft paint in these handy little bottles. The ratio was about 1/3 paint to 2/3 glue, but I just eyeballed it. We then traced over every line and allowed the paint to dry.

Finally, it was time to paint!

Doesn't this ice cream cone look good enough to eat!

The best thing about this project was that it was easy enough that everyone felt successful and had fun.

Before we knew it, time was up. Until next week, keep calm and craft on!

Many thanks to That Artist Woman for her awesome original idea!

Keep Calm and Craft On!

This year I have the most wonderful box of Crayons. My students are my daily salvation from an otherwise rough school year. Every. Single. Day. I say a prayer of thanksgiving for this blessing. The Crayon Box is a safe haven.

Outside of the Crayon Box...not so much. There is so much advocating for public education-especially in the defense of our most vulnerable students- that needs to be done, but alas, for the time being...I am taking a break.

One teacher at my school is really pressing on in spite of all the cutbacks and chaos. She has rallied to form after school clubs. How could I say "no" to that kind of positive energy?  Forget all the reasons the kids need clubs, I need to push myself as a defense against low moral. So, I have agreed to teach an after school craft club. No pressure. No grades. No money. Just for fun. Stencils and tracing allowed.

Every Wednesday until the end of school I will be hosting 15 or so fourth and fifth graders for some craft therapy. We have met once so far. It was wonderful. There was a brief moment when they informed me that one of my former students is now a dad. (I nearly died. He's 15! I knew the day would come when my students would be parents. Still, I was not prepared for this.) Other than that bit of shock, it was fun to hang out, making stuff and chatting.

 Stained Glass on Paper Name Collage

My go-to blog for this group is That Artist Woman. Gail is a professional art teacher and her projects are all terrific and easily adaptable.  We started with this Stained Glass on Paper project. I even had her "art boards" made up at the Home Depot. Mine aren't desk size, but already I love them and swear by them. Be sure to check them out at the end of this post. They truly do make art with kids so much easier!

After the basic introduction to the project I put on some music (the sound track to Cool Runnings- the Jamaican bobsled team - remember them?) and the kids chilled out. I even did some clean up and prep for the next day.

As the kids were leaving they said things like, " I can't wait till next Wendsday!" and I feel exactly the same way.

Speaking of needing some positive energy, something to look forward to and a little encouragement...

How about helping a homeless brother or sister with a pair of socks and a favorite quote, Bible verse or expression of care?

Please check out my Kind Words & Warm Feet Drive for Comfort Socks!

How wonderful it is that nobody need wait a single moment before starting to improve the world.  ~Anne Frank





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You can improve the world for one person with a pair of socks and a bit of love! Check it out today!